6 Billion Phones Eh?

Because it's always a good time to show off a Galaxy

The International Telecommunication Union has revealed to the world a very interesting statistic. They found that at the end of 2011 there was 6 billion phone subscriptions, or active SIM cards (as is a better way to think about it), world wide. Considering that the world just passed the 7 billion mark in population, we can get a pretty good sense of just how important and common place phones have become.

Of course you have to keep in mind that we're talking about SIM cards here. There are quite a number of people who own two or more SIM cards, and since each card is counted as one phone, the whole "almost everyone must have a phone" argument doesn't hold any water.

If we break it down a little more, we find that developed countries rank in at 70% online and that developing countries come in at 24% online.

It is said now that mobile phones are now twice as numerous as the traditional fixed or "house" phones.

I just find it really amazing how fast the world is adopting mobile phones. It's no longer a matter of comparing how many phones were used last decade, but how many were used last year. We live in a time when mega-powerhouse companies like Google are pumping in around a million added subscriptions each day, and that is just one company. Sure others like RIM and Nokia have taken a hit over the last two years. But there loses do not even come close to the gains made in the mobile phone market. We literally live in the time now when you can take a look down the street and confidently say that almost every single one of those people has a mobile phone.

These are fast moving days people. Sometimes it's just nice to stop and look at how far we've come.